The Matrix

I had a heated exchange with a long-time friend about the truth of the world. Incidentaly this person has not lived in India for more than seven years of his twenty-seven ; and so its not surpising that he be a patron of Indian culture – but he goes further – he’s a staunch RSS supporter and preaches Sanatan Dharma as the core ingredient of the condiment we call Indian culture. And that of a person working on cutting edge technology in the Silicon Valley,sounded quite novel.
The exchange followed due to the misconception that I was one of the Westernised, cynical Indians- raring to move West – the conclusion he jumped into when I divulged my atheist nature and my support for the (West-originated) philosophies of subjectivity (Ayn Rand) and existentialism.
I had to final shout that I was not Westernised, neither Indianised nor Orientalised.( I had to tell him that Sanskrit was my favorite language). I told him that I eclecticly picked whatever was the best of all religions,cultures,races. I told him that I was out of the Matrix – while most people in the world still were not.
I was aware of the truth of my statements only later – Wachowski’s movie gives voice to the malaise which has run amok in humankind and all violence we see around us is directly or indirectly attributable to the existence of the Matrix – or rather the Matrices.
Let me explain – there is hardly a thing called an unbiased opinion or account of anything – my friend accused me of reading history that was written by the West and so biased heavily against Hindutva.I asked him what history to read – Ramayana – Upnishads – they say they are the centre of the world – they and nobody else – its biased against West, or East or north or south – they donot take into account even the ‘existence’ of other races, cultures in ‘Satyuga’ – they finally claim that all that is diverse now has descended from Hindutva.My friend disputed the Aryan invasion theory – I guess what he had in mind was cross-Aryan invasion – the influx of Sanskrit speakers into West.
The point is ‘who do you believe’. I was an extremely gullible person once – believed everything that was told to me – so many people started telling me so many things – totally contradicting each other – that I had no peace of mind – till I decided not to trust anyone – you tell me what you think and I’ll see whether I want to accept it or not- the Self is my Supreme Court – so I decided I won’t be part of any Group that strives to become a Matrix. They want you to believe in what they want and not what you want.Your right and wrong is decided by the Matrix rather than by you yourself.Of course there can be well-intended Matrices as well – the Mission of Charity by Mother Teresa is one example – the Matrix of Compassion.
But most are ill-founded and ill-intended – but the ‘Nodes’ of the Matrix never see that truth – they transform into Agent Smith-s- the Jihad Matrix, the Hndutva MAtrix, the Nazi (and neo-Nazi) Matrix, the Marxist Matrix (which is the most unabashed one – they kill the self completely – the Jihad Matrix does so only physically), the ‘Jesus-loves-you’ Matrix.
Every morning you wake up and you run into Agents – everything said by everyone is intended at making you believe what they believe.
I wake up and see my landlady – she says that I live in the best , the most comfortable house on the Planet,I switch on TV – an ad  tells me that their product is number one (many competitors do that as well for the SAME PRODUCT),I goto to one news channel – they say that a ‘professor has been beaten to death’ I go to another and they say ‘a professor dies of stress and heart-attack’ both channel claim to broadcast only truth – the list is just enless- every moment of the day someone is metamorphising into Agent Smith for his Matrix.
I have a long standing joke wth my former room-mates – everytime we used to go house-hunting – and we would ask someone on street whether there was a house to be let – he immediately transforms into an Agent Smith – just like in the movie – he leaves his original occupation (vending vegetables , tailoring are all true examples) - all transform into a realtor – and would be desirous of Something when the deal is done.
Ofcourse ,all I am talking of could be bull-shit to you – I am no Agent Smith. Please let me know what you think by putting comments.